Quadrangle
by Lysythe
Summary: 1: Rukawa starts off the new year in the hospital. 2: Sendoh visits Shohoku to deal with some of his spare chocolates- and with some homemade as well. 3: Haruko retrieves Rukawa from his hospital stay. 4: Sakuragi has a terrible day. Concrit appreciated.
1. New Year's Day

The boy was sixteen, just, and he was in the hospital. He was alone in the room, and the only sound was the rasp of his breath.

For once, he could not sleep.

He was in a lot of pain, and he couldn't sleep.

All he could do was alternate between staring up at the ceiling and staring at the blackness behind his eyelids.

He tried everything he had heard that others were supposed to do when they were trying to sleep.

He tried counting sheep as they jumped over a fence, but the sheep turned into basketballs dropping through a hoop. That didn't work.

He tried singing himself to sleep (well, humming, since he couldn't speak very well at the moment). That didn't work either, with the addition that it made his throat hurt even worse.

He even tried remembering one of his history teacher's lectures, which were a surefire method of putting not only himself but his classmates to sleep. Usually. All he got was a revision of the battle of Sekigahara and the passing of a sleepless fifteen minutes.

He wondered, briefly, how the rest were celebrating the New Year. His parents, he knew, were both overseas, as were some of his family. The rest of his family was either in Tokyo or Okinawa.

Probably the team was partying at Mitsui's house. His senior had mentioned something to that effect the last time he visited.

No one had visited him for the past few days. He had told himself that, after all, his parents were busy with work, and everyone else was rushing to prepare for the New Year festivities. No one had the time to spare to drop in on him and see how he was doing. Besides, everyone knew that a call was impossible, since his voice was currently so hoarse he could barely be understood.

Not being able to sleep led his thoughts into strange places.

He would have turned over if his leg had allowed him to. As it was, he remained in the same position in the bed, and his back was beginning to ache. He glanced at the clock beside him; the numbers told him it was already past one. His first hour being sixteen, and it was spent sleeplessly.

He was about to shut his eyes in a futile attempt to sleep again when the door to his room opened. He turned his head- _is it the nurse? _- to see his visitor. The silhouette was too tall, and far too masculine, to be the nurse.

"Oi, kitsune," came the rough voice of (only one would say) his greatest rival.

(Of course, had you questioned anyone in Ryonan, Kainan, Shoyo or any other basketball team in Kanagawa, the answer would have been Sendoh Akira. But the one currently in the doorway of his room was the one he had christened the do'aho, his greatest headache, and who had self-christened himself as his greatest rival.)

He grimaced. Currently, he didn't have the energy, or the willpower, or even the voice, to deal with Sakuragi Hanamichi. He managed a grunt, to acknowledge the other boy's presence.

Come to think of it, why _was_ he here? The redhead had never appeared, nor been mentioned, by any of his previous visitors, save Ayako-sempai's passing on an apology from him. He didn't look like he wanted to be here, either; he was shifting on his feet, clearly uncomfortable.

He tried to speak, to tell him to sit down, but had a coughing fit instead, and finally just gestured to the chair beside him. The other boy, obviously unnerved by the fierce hacking from his characteristically silent teammate, sat down.

They remained in their positions for nearly five minutes, the raspy sound of inhaling and exhaling filling the room. Finally, groping for anything to disrupt the harsh noise, Sakuragi said, "Sorry."

When the patient didn't speak, or make any other noise to acknowledge this, he went on, "I'm sorry I accused you of playing sick. I… I shouldn't have… I mean…" He swallowed, and continued, "Anyway, I'm sorry." He pulled out a bottle from his bag. "I don't think the doctor would let me give this to you 'cause it's not hospital food, well, drink, so I snuck in." He held up a bottle. In the dim light reflected into the window, Rukawa had to squint to identify the liquid, labeled as soda.

He snorted, and pushed himself up to grab the pencil and paper on the table, gesturing for the other boy to switch on the light. Once it was bright enough for him to see what he was writing, he scribbled, _Do'aho._

The redhead's temper flared, as usual, and made to shout and grab his head for the habitual headbutt, but he stopped, remembering where he was and why there was a need to be quiet. In a volume much lower than his regular level, he said, his voice tinged with irritation at both Rukawa as well as not being able to shout, "What the hell, you damn kitsune? I'm apologizing, I'm even bringing you a nice drink and you're insulting me?"

_Can't drink anything except water. Doctor says sweet stuff will irritate my throat and make it worse._

Sakuragi made a noise in the back of his throat which seemed to indicate further irritation. "Crap, then I snuck it in for nothing. Shoulda come in the afternoon instead."

_Why not evening?_

"I was celebrating with my gundan, idiot. _Obviously_." Sakuragi, remembering the occasion, went on, "Oh, yeah. Happy New Year and all that, kitsune."

_Happy New Year._ After some thought, he wrote on, _it's my birthday too._

"Eh? Oh. Happy birthday, then." Sakuragi was silent for a while, and then shifted forward in his chair. "Ne, so if you can't drink the soda, can I have it?"

The other boy shrugged and nodded. While Sakuragi gulped down the liquid, he wrote: _Don't you celebrate with your family?_

"My mother's… away." Sakuragi shrugged. "It doesn't matter, we don't celebrate anything together much anyway."

Rukawa nodded in agreement. While he and his parents had dutifully visited the shrine on New Year's Day when he was young, they'd eventually stopped in favour of a private New Year's/birthday celebration at home instead.

_How's practice going?_

"Okay. Ryochin's been riding our asses since you've been gone- you know how many more rounds he makes us run? _Ten _more." Sakuragi sounded aggrieved, but then cackled. "Too bad you won't be experienced enough to run ten more rounds when you come back! No, I'm sure you'll collapse after the second round instead!"

Rukawa made a deep-throated growl which he instantly regretted; it made his throat hurt even more. He reached for the glass of water by his bed, only to find it empty. He waved the empty glass at Sakuragi. When Sakuragi didn't respond, he put the glass down and wrote: _pour me some water._

"What, can't you do it yourself?" Sakuragi said, more out of habit than anything else, but picked up the jug and filled the glass. The other boy gulped down the cool water in relief.

They went on talking a little longer, one in speech, the other in writing (though he remained relatively quiet in terms of communication). Eventually, Sakuragi asked, a little pensively, "Hey, Rukawa. Aren't you interested in girls at all?"

When Rukawa didn't seem to react in any way, Sakuragi went on, "I mean, you don't seem to date and you've got your huge (and idiotic) fanclub and there's Ha…" The name seemed to stick in his throat, so he swallowed and went on, "Well, anyway, you don't seem to have any interest at all in dating."

No answer.

Sakuragi had a look at Rukawa and found him asleep. He made a derisive snort and muttered, "Typical baka kitsune." He left, taking the empty soda bottle as he left. The paper and pencil remained on the bed where Rukawa had released them, to make his falling asleep look more natural.

2:30 am and he _still_ couldn't get to sleep. Well, at least pretending had helped him get rid of the do'aho.

_Hey, Rukawa. Aren't you interested in girls at all?_

_Now you have the air of a high school ace, Rukawa._

_Work hard in the nationals!_

_Rukawa, you've improved!_

_Well done, man!_

_See you next week, Rukawa. Say hi to Sakuragi for me, will you?_

_Ryonan will beat Shohoku next year. Let's make a bet, Rukawa!_

_Two days after he was supposed to play one-on-one with Sendoh; four days after he had broken his leg; six days after he had contracted laryngitis. He had not been able to contact him, to tell him not to come; Sendoh must have waited all day._

_A week after he had been admitted to the hospital. Ayako-sempai had turned up with Sendoh in tow: "Hey, Rukawa! How's your leg? You still sick? When d'you think it'll heal? Should I camp here until you can play again? I can't wait 'til we play together again!"_

"No," he murmured, his voice barely a whisper, barely a sound at all. "No, I'm not, Sakuragi."

*

In case it isn't clear, yes, it is Sendoh and not Sakuragi that Rukawa is thinking about. Because Sendoh doesn't speak to Rukawa directly very often, I couldn't use many quotes from the manga and ended up with a longer conclusion than I had planned. (sigh.)

And Happy New Year to all who read this.


	2. Valentine's Day

He'd gotten up just for this, gone all the way just for this. He took a quick peek into the haversack full of choice chocolates- would they be good enough, he wondered, would they be _enough_, and most importantly, would his own (slightly burnt) chocolate stand out among them?

Hell, maybe he should just dump these in the trashcan now and head back and _maybe_ reach practice on time for once so his birthday celebrations wouldn't be marred by Taoka-sensei berating him again.

_Coward_, came the inevitable traitorous thought.

He argued back to his conscience, _Not my fault I was born on Valentine's Day. Blame 'kaa-chan and 'tou-chan for that. Besides, I didn't even need to make it, or come here. I've never even made chocolates before- that's what girls do._

_Then why'd you do it?_ rebutted his conscience. _You could've stopped yourself any time. You could've repackaged one of the girls' chocolates instead of making it. You don't even have to give it in person. Shohoku's practice starts in the afternoon, same as Ryonan. No reason why __**he**__ would be around at this time of day._

While this internal debate was proceeding, his feet automatically made their way towards the gym doors and opened them. The hall was empty, and dark.

No, he was mistaken. There was a girl over by the light switches, and she looked at him, apparently startled by his appearance. She flipped on the lights, as it seemed she had been about to when he opened the door.

Once the lights had all flickered to life, she tilted her head in a gesture of inquiry. "Sendoh-sa… Sendoh-sempai? Why are you here?"

"Uh…" He fumbled for an answer, and held up his open backpack with the wrapped chocolates showing through. "I got way too many chocolates yesterday- Valentine's day, you know- so I figured Sakuragi might like them- not that I'm taking pity on him or anything but everyone else on my team already got something so I figured why not-" and he went on babbling about chocolate and gifts and Sakuragi (though not the complete reason why he had come here) until he ran out of words, and then he looked at the girl. Now that there was light, he recognized her as Shohoku's other manager, who had only turned up at the winter tournament.

The silence that resounded in the hall was heavy, oppressive, and she spoke first, uncertain. "So… do you want to wait until… until Sakuragi-kun gets here? Because… because our practice is at one, and it's only nine now, and I don't think Sakuragi-kun is going to turn up before then."

"Oh. Huh. Uh… I'm not sure." He rubbed the back of his neck. "I guess I could leave the stuff here- uh, look, are you going to be here until then?"

The girl blushed, an amusing thing to watch, since her face went from a fair yellow to smooth pink and then firetruck red. "Yes," she finally admitted. "I got up early to visit Rukawa-kun, but he was asleep, so I just left his cho- his cho-" She went redder and redder, a Sakuragi's-hair shade of red, just trying to speak the word 'chocolate' in connection with Rukawa, and finally gave in and went on: "-his present on the table and left and came here." She fidgeted, twiddling her fingers together. "I thought I'd get some chocolates for everyone else on the team, but all the shops are closed right now and I only remembered this morning."

He could feel his conscience butting in again. Before he could stop himself, he blurted, "Hey, you might as well have these." Without stopping to think, he pulled the large plastic bag of chocolates out of his bag and pushed them into her arms. He babbled on and on: "-they generally taste okay, some of them have my name and stuff but you can tear that off, if you've got some wrapping paper I guess you can change the wrapping-" until finally he ran out of breath and she was standing there staring at him through glazed eyes, still trying to slowly process his confusingly tumbling words.

He was about to turn tail and run, having assured himself that the chocolates would get to Sakuragi safely (some of them, at least), but again, his conscience prevailed. So he stayed, and helped her (Akagi Haruko, she eventually told him when he asked, an hour later) with the unwrapping and rewrapping (although where she'd gotten the paper from he'd no idea). As they worked, they talked about basketball (it _was_ the nearest subject to mind, and a common ground between them).

When she held up the shabbily wrapped, unlabelled package that was meant for Sakuragi, he practically tackled her to stop her doing anything to it. Yet again, and in the nick of time, his conscience stepped in to metaphorically grab him by the collar. By dint of effort, he managed to work the words out of his mouth before she started unwrapping: "Oh, that one looks okay. I don't think we need to do anything to that one."

"You think so?" she said, frowning slightly, examining it. "Oh, yes, it doesn't have your name. I suppose that's all right."

"You should give that to Sakuragi," he said, attempting to feign a casual tone. "He probably won't mind the wrapping."

"Good idea," she said thoughtfully.

Some time later, near the end of the rewrapping (he really had been given far too many chocolates, he mused), she said suddenly, "Shouldn't Rukawa-kun have some of these?"

"Huh?" came the absent reply. He was concentrating more on getting the scotch tape _just_ right than on her words. After a few minutes, when it had penetrated through: "Oh. Rukawa. Right, yeah, he should get some of these too, huh. I'll drop in on him on the way back with some of 'em."

"Oh, no, why don't I do that," she said, a bit too quickly. "You've got to go for basketball practice at Ryonan, right? I wouldn't want to delay you."

He shot up at the mention of Ryonan. "Oh sh- I mean- man, I gotta go before Taoka-sensei chews me out again!" He grabbed his bag (now empty of any chocolate) and was out the door, tossing over his shoulder the words: "Don't forget, give that package with the red-with-monkeys paper to Sakuragi!"

In retrospect, maybe it had been a bit mean to use that particular wrapping paper, but it would have been so fun to see the infuriated look that was so adorable on Sakuragi's face. Too bad he wouldn't get to see it.

_Hmm… I should probably go back and get Haruko-chan to take a picture when he gets it._

-

This chapter has been the hardest to write, since there is zero interaction between these two in both manga and anime.

I hope the reason for the title 'Quadrangle' is obvious now. Naturally, since Haruko's birthday is not known, her chapter can come next, or come after Sakuragi's. I'm still debating on the order, but honestly, it can go either way. Sakuragi's birthday is April 1st, by the way.

Oh, and Happy Valentine's Day.


	3. White Day

Haruko twisted her hands together as she waited outside the hospital ward. Within, the doctor was getting Rukawa ready to leave the hospital. His leg, she was told, would remain in its cast for another three weeks, by which time it would be the new school year. Still, his laryngitis had run its course. Since his parents were still overseas, he would be staying at Miyagi's house. However, at this time basketball practice was underway, so she had been tasked with taking care of Rukawa and bringing him to Miyagi's home.

"All done," the doctor announced, leaving the room. He held the door open for Rukawa, who clacked through with a crutch. Haruko picked up his lone suitcase- he could hardly be expected to carry it in one hand and manage everything else when he was gripping the crutch with the other- and hurried after him. Even temporarily crippled, he moved quickly.

Once both were settled into the cab, Haruko was practically squirming in her seat. Her eyes were cast downwards, her cheeks reddening.

Rukawa paid no attention to her.

A few minutes on, Haruko had calmed herself down, and glanced at him occasionally.

It was a long cab ride, but before Rukawa could be lulled to sleep, Haruko chose to speak.

"Um… did you like the chocolates, Rukawa-kun?"

He turned his head.

"The… the ones from Valentine's Day," she clarified.

"…got a lot of chocolate," he muttered. His voice was huskier than usual, from disuse.

"Mine was the pink one with the music notes?" she tried, her voice becoming a nervous almost-squeak.

"…was okay."

"The others were actually for Sendoh-sempai but he said that since there were too many why didn't we have some of them, so-"

"_Sendoh?_" He had reached out and was gripping her arm painfully.

"Ru-Rukawa-kun, that hurts-"

His grip only tightened. "What do chocolates given to me have to do with Sendoh?"

"S-Sendoh-sempai had too many chocolates so he came to- please, Rukawa-kun, you're _hurting_ me-" She choked back a sob and there were tears in her eyes and at last he released her, but he was still staring at her, with anger and something like hurt in his eyes.

"I'm sorry." His words seemed meaningless, but he went on, "Explain."

So Haruko poured out the incident of the previous Valentine's Day, at which practice he'd not been present. When she was done, she leaned back and stared out the window. Her heart hurt. Rukawa… He had been distressed at the mention of Sendoh and chocolate. He had hurt her. He hadn't cared about her enough to not hurt her in his distress-

No. She bit her lip, bit back tears, stared out the window.

It wasn't her fault.

It wasn't her fault.

Nothing was her fault.

Nothing.

When she glanced at Rukawa, he was merely staring into space, straight ahead. For once, he did not have his coldly attractive expression that so many of her peers swooned over.

He had the same expression that she had been fighting seconds ago.

The revelation that her beloved did not love her, cared nothing about her. The clinical fact that there was nowhere to go in this fallacy of a relationship. The sharp incision through the lies she had told herself to the plain truth that all she had thought of him was in her head.

When the cab pulled up in front of Miyagi's house, Haruko helped Rukawa out, got his suitcase out of the trunk and unlocked the door with the keys loaned her. She got him settled quickly, and then returned to the cab, to go back to Shohoku.

Maybe Ayako had thought she was doing her a favour. A little meeting with her crush to cheer her up on her birthday.

Worst present ever.

Still, she put on a brave face and smiled sunnily at the team, who had split in two and were practicing against each other, offense against defense. Sakuragi returned her smile with a big grin and a wave.

Afterward, (because, after all, it was still White Day) he handed her a small box, and blushed goofily, and grinned. She thanked him for the gift, and even (rather daringly) kissed him on the cheek.

And yet, all the while, her heart ached and ached and ached.

At least, she consoled herself unconsciously, he was going through the same turmoil as herself.

-

FYI, White Day is when boys who have received chocolates from girls on Valentine's Day reutrn the favour.


	4. April Fools' Day

Sakuragi Hanamichi is having a terrible day, which is not helped by the fact that it's his birthday. Oh, he does celebrate it, but the happiness, the fun stuff, the _utter lack of misery_ never occurs until the day after.

What the hell were his parents thinking, conceiving him to eventually be born on a day that would cause him so much grief?

We speak, of course, of April Fools' Day, that day of pranks and japes and laughter and tomfoolery, where it's always more pleasant to give than to receive. Already Sakuragi Hanamichi has been on the receiving end of ten such pranks; seven are the result of either his gundan or the basketball team. He is inadvertently involved in the remaining when he firstly stumbles into a cafeteria food fight, secondly is sprayed by water when entering the bathroom, and thirdly is splatted by a cake when entering his classroom. In each instance, the perpetrators hop to attention and babble apologies that he doesn't listen to and end up with aching and bruised heads for their troubles. (Actually, the gundan suffered this fate too. The basketball team escaped only due to the fact that Miyagi threatened to bench him if he tried to revenge himself on them via violence.)

It's late in the day now, evening, basketball practice over, and he bids a cheery farewell to Haruko-chan (his teammates a distant second thought) and heads on home (pausing only to retrieve his uniform from where it has been flung all over the school compound with the rest of the team's; the gundan are severely headbutted by Sakuragi Hanamichi, and punched by Rukawa Kaede, and the rest of the team consider themselves well revenged by their two tensai players). The prank count goes up to eleven, and his buoyant joy at Haruko-chan's smile is dampened.

Along the way he is distracted by what appears to be a sale on chocolate doughnuts, which taste very good to his mind; he is enraged to discover that it's merely a scam, and hence beats up the offending crook.

He's still stewing from the lack of promised chocolate doughnuts when a cheery voice hails him from behind, and he turns round to find a bright smile from a perpetually smiling opponent of his.

He glares, and in defense Sendoh puts up his hands, a peace gesture, and insists that he doesn't _do_ April Fools' Day, it's too much work and anyway he has enough trouble trying not to fall for anything. Sakuragi Hanamichi eyes his rival distrustfully, but falls into step beside him, and they natter on, wandering hither and thither, and he thinks in the back of his mind that it's good that his mother is in Kyoto visiting her sister, because it looks like he'll be late home.

And then Sendoh mentions his birthday, and without thinking he says that his own is today, so Sendoh stops in his tracks and then grabs him by the arm and drags him to the nearest fast food restaurant. When Sakuragi protests and tries to pull away, Sendoh says that his birthday ought to be celebrated even if it _is_ April Fools' Day as well, so will he just stop whining and come and eat a birthday dinner with him?

(a faint colour in his cheeks as he speaks, which Sakuragi doesn't notice, because Sendoh is someone he must defeat.)

So Sakuragi agrees, and he orders almost half the menu, while Sendoh orders half of the remaining, and they get down to eating. While they eat they go on nattering as before, about basketball and girls and nothing at all.

(Sendoh talks flippantly about girls, and he says they're overrated, and Sakuragi wonders what _does_ that mean anyway, if girls are overrated to a guy reputed for being a hentai? But he forgets about it as the unagi-don arrives.)

And then Sendoh mentions Valentine's Day, and Sakuragi remembers the stupid burnt chocolates wrapped in the stupid red paper with the stupid monkeys and asks why the hell Sendoh thought it was a good idea to give them to him when he could have saved Haruko-chan the trouble and thrown it away.

(a brief flicker in Sendoh's eyes- hurt? sadness?- but Sakuragi doesn't notice.)

Sendoh shrugs and says that the wrapping reminded him of him, and surely the chocolates weren't that bad anyway? But Sakuragi retorts that no, the others were _much___better and anyway, what kind of idiot would give _burnt_ stuff to somebody, and it's lucky that he decided to eat it anyway after the way Sendoh tried to palm it off on him. Sendoh chuckles and proclaims that Sakuragi will eat anything.

Sakuragi rolls his eyes and says that of course not, even he draws the line somewhere, and they're off on another tangent. It takes a while for the subject to come round to Haruko-chan, and when it does they're midway through dessert with bowls of different ice cream sundaes melting slowly around them and Sakuragi's cheeks are bulging with chocolate cake when Sendoh voices his opinion that Haruko-chan is a very sweet girl.

Sakuragi's eyes bulge, and he makes a sound like he's _almost_ choking, and then he swallows and he levels a glare at Sendoh again. Yes, he agrees that Haruko-chan is a very sweet girl, and it's hard not to like her. But Sendoh shouldn't even think about trying to date her, he says, because (his voice cracks a bit) she only has eyes for Rukawa.

(in the back of his mind he subconsciously recalls how she has grown subtly less unresisting to Rukawa's face and voice and plays, but he doesn't and won't register it consciously.)

Sendoh nods his head, says he isn't interested in her _that_ way, but it was obvious when he met her and they talked about Rukawa. Sakuragi eats without tasting what he eats, after Sendoh says this. He churns Sendoh's words over and over in his head, and his expression becomes more morose.

(Sendoh wants to ask why, if he likes Haruko-chan so much, he doesn't confess to her, but he knows the answer would be the same answer to the question why he doesn't confess to Sakuragi.)

Sakuragi says, very softly, so that Sendoh has to strain to hear him, that he wishes Rukawa would acknowledge Haruko-chan, at least. That at least he would say that he knows how she feels, and he's sorry, but he doesn't return her feelings. Then maybe, just maybe, he would have a chance.

Sendoh says loudly that he thinks they've had enough, and he fumbles for the money to pay while Sakuragi murmurs a subdued thanks and leaves, as he walks out the door and tries not to think about how sad Haruko-chan looks when Rukawa doesn't say anything in return to her cheery greetings. His birthday, as it has always been, has been terrible this year.

(Sendoh leaves after managing to fish out enough money, and he too goes home without a smile on his face.)

-

I am reading WAY TOO MUCH JU. It's kind of scary how much her (I think) writing style is leaking into my fic.

Anyturtles, Quadrangle is complete. Two pairs of characters, Sakuragi and Haruko, and Sendoh and Rukawa, will not be written about unless I get it in my head to write a sequel.

Happy April Fools' Day, y'all.


End file.
